20°C | Wednesday September 11, 2024 
10 August 2023
By James Mullan
The Northern Suburbs Shoremen have finished on top of the rugby union Shute Shield regular competition for the second year in a row, continuing one of their best purple patches in their 100 year participation in the competition.
And it’s not only the Shoremen who have topped their comp locally. The North Shore Bombers men have topped the Sydney AFL regular season, while the Norths’ NBL1 women’s squad is into the grand final this weekend against Manly-Warringah.
The North Sydney Bears are also looking strong, five points clear of the next team at the top of the NSW Cup second tier competition. If they can account for the Roosters, next week they are also guaranteed a minor premiership.
For the Shoremen, finishing top of the comp was far from certain at the midpoint of the season when they had won just four of their first seven games. Yet they came storming home to top the comp when they won nine of their next nine games.
Captain Harry Burey told the Sun they had learned from those losses and re-focussed.
“Shute Shield is a very tight competition. Those kinds of games you can turn slightly off, even the worst teams in the comp can pull your pants down. At times, we were trying a little too hard and putting too much pressure on ourselves but it’s been a bit more of a relaxed environment for the last few months,” he said.
The Shute Shield competition is a semi-professional league, with the majority of players working as well as playing. Burey believes Norths’ ability to keep the majority of the roster consistent over the last few seasons has helped lead to success.
“90% of our players work full time and the other 10% are working part time or studying. Hats off to the boys’ effort they put in over a long pre-season and 18 rounds to consistently keep turning up to training and work hard when some players have been on the tools all day or they’ve done a 10 hour day in the office,” he said.
Looking forward to the finals, Burey is not getting complacent.
“The six teams in the finals now could all beat each other. Those finals games come down to those small incremental moments. It’s about making sure we are at our best and focussed for Saturday,” he said.
First up in the finals they will host the Hunter Wildfires, whom they previously beat in the regular season round. In even better news, if they progress through every semi final will be hosted at North Sydney Oval.
A key part of the Shoremen’s success has been their coach Zak Beer, who has taken the side to the finals in every season he has been at the club.
Captain Burey says his coach has brought much needed consistency.
“We seemed like we were getting a new coach every year and starting from scratch but having Zak Beer over the last four years has helped with that consistency factor. He’s still such a young coach and aspirational, gives us a lot of energy to the role and is very detail oriented,” Burey said.
As for the style of footy they are playing, Beer is innovative.
“He watches a lot of footy and brings in elements of a few different styles or rugby, be it European, UK or even Japanese rugby, he seems to pick up details from around the world.” Burey added.
Beer recently extended his contract with Norths through 2024.
“The success of the club is due to all of the great people we have involved here at Norths. This is a special place, we have an exciting group of talented players right throughout and I’m fortunate to work closely together with some of the competition’s brightest and hard-working coaches coming through our club,” Beer said.
“Cohesion and stability are foundations of any successful organisation and our club is no different. It’s pleasing to continue to build our legacy into the coming years, however, all focus from myself and the entire playing and coaching group is firmly on this season, making history together in 2023.” Beer added.
The challenge now for the Shoremen is bringing home the Shute Shield for the first time the drought breaking 2016 premiership. Last season, the side bowed out in the Preliminary Finals after winning the Minor Premiership, so they will definitely be wary of repeating the same errors. Randwick, Eastwood, Manly and Gordon also made the finals and provide serious competition for the title with only four wins separating the 6th placed Hunter with the top placed Norths.